French interventionism on the rise in the Middle East and North Africa

The downscaling of US presence in the Middle East and North Africa during the Obama presidency left a space for other powers like Russia, Iran – but also France – to assume a more active role.

Since the 2011 intervention in Libya, France has at several occasions pushed for military involvement – not only in North Africa and Sahel, but also in Syria.

In the new DIIS book 'New Conflict Dynamics: Between Regional Autonomy and Intervention in the Middle East and North Africa', Manni Crone takes stock of the recent French military involvement in these regions. She argues that although Obama was reluctant to engage in military operations in the Middle East, he actually stepped up a discreet presence in Africa applying a new strategy of 'light footprint'.

In Libya and the broader Sahel region, France increasingly cooperates with the American army in a joint counter-terrorism effort. The fight against Islamic State in Libya and the effort to counter various al-Qaeda groups in the Sahel implies intelligence sharing and cooperation in operations involving special forces.